NAIROBI, Kenya, February 3 – Gor Mahia assistant coach Frank Ouna is troubled by the injuries of defenders Godfrey Walusimbi and Musa Mohammed, just nine days before they host Madagascar’s CNAPS in the first-leg of CAF Champions League at Nairobi’s Nyayo National Stadium.
Ouna who saw his side thrashed 3-0 by visitors Power Dynamos in a build-up match also confirmed midfielders Eric Ochieng’ and Ali Abondo are suffering from knocks while newly signed full-backs Abouba Sibomana and Karim Nizigiyimana as well as forward Kagere Medie all from Rwanda are yet to arrive in the country.
“The injury of Musa is very worrying than the results we picked from the friendly. I hope we will have a full house by next week since about eight of our key players are out so the lineup is not settled. We are trying to build a cohesive unit.
“We are playing tough matches so that the players can get fit because the Champions League is unfair to us considering our calendar, bearing in mind we will be featuring in KPL too,” Ouna underscored.
Despite the upsets, the assistant coach was confident they will be ready for the continental assignment where they target reaching the group stages for the first time since 1992 where they were eliminated at the quarter-finals.
“We have quite some time and I believe we will be ready to face CNAPS. We identified some mistakes from the friendly which we will work on including our defense and coordination in midfield. The positive thing from the friendly is that we created a lot of chances and the only thing we now have to work on is our finishing,” Ouna said.
K’Ogalo who suffered their second friendly loss after a 2-0 defeat to Kenyan Premier League side Bandari will play one more build-up match on Saturday to complete their pre-season.
This comes as club chairman Ambrose Rachier said they are facing tough financial times especially with the huge burden expected for their CAF campaigns.
“We are actually not prepared in terms of finances. We have serious financial challenges, mainly occasioned by the transfer window. We have been involved in heavy recruitment and we have not even completed paying players their sign-on fees.
We have also had a period of inactivity of two months where we have had no income from gate collections which has been our major way of getting funds. We are facing an international match in ten days and we have to meet a lot of expenses. This is a mammoth task for us,” Rachier declared.
The Champions League match will be played February 14 with the return leg set for a fortnight later in Madagascar.